Opinion

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  EBSCO Backtracks On ‘Anti-Jewish’ BDS Index

  Pro-Palestinian activists hold a banner reading ‘Boycott Israel’ in Paris in 2010. / Getty Images Score this one in the victory column for BDS supporters and, much more broadly, for anyone who believes we should use language accurately — especially when we’re dealing with loaded terms like “anti-Semitism.” EBSCO Information Services, a major provider of…

  By Sigal Samuel

  3 min read
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  Opinion

  3 Dangerous Bills That Will Rock Israel This Week

  Getty Images This is a big week in Israeli politics. Three sets of bills are being introduced into the Knesset for their second and third readings, and all of them have far-reaching consequences. Though there has been much handwringing over them, over fears that Israeli democracy is being ruined, there is no doubt that the…

  By Brent E. Sasley Mar 11, 2014 | 4 min read
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  Opinion

  News Quiz: Albert Einstein, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Moe Howard

  Albert Einstein, Moe Howard and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad together in the same quiz? What could possibly go right?

  By Lenore Skenazy Mar 11, 2014 | < 1 min read

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• Jodi Rudoren This is my last column as editor of the Forward

  

• Jay Michaelson American Jews were played — now what?

  

• Rob Eshman There’s a shocking new report on civilian deaths in Gaza. If only it were accurate.

  

• Nora Berman Is Netflix’s new show the most Jewish cartoon ever?

  

• Dan Perry Israel is not deliberately killing journalists in Gaza. But it does bear responsibility for their deaths

  

• Emily Tamkin Entering motherhood — and an obsession with the works of an Italian Jewish literary hero

  

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  Opinion

  Fighting Anti-Gay Hate on Purim

  Demonstrators in Nairobi, Kenya rally against wave of anti-gay legislation in Africa. Getty Images. The ancient rabbi Hillel famously asked: “If I am not for myself, who will be for me? If I am only for myself, what am I? If not now, when?” I feel it is important to answer the first two questions…

  By Barney Frank Mar 11, 2014 | 4 min read
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  Opinion

  Why Vladimir Putin Will Keep Playing Jewish Card in Ukraine Crisis

  The Kremlin has issued more condemnations of anti-Semitism in the past week than in the preceding decade. The danger of anti-Semitism was on the lips of the Russian Ambassador to the United Nations, Vitaly Churkin, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, and President Vladimir Putin himself. Not Russian anti-Semitism, of course. It was Ukrainian “Neo-Nazism, fascism and…

  By David E. Fishman Mar 11, 2014 | 4 min read
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  Opinion

  The Dark Side of Purim

  Esther denouncing Haman / Ernest Normand These days, many liberal Jews think of Purim as a play date for the kids and a night of drunken debauchery for the grown-ups. We think of costumes and songs and noisemakers, a kind of carnival spirit. But the levity with which we approach Purim is actually pretty astonishing….

  By Shaul Magid Mar 10, 2014 | 4 min read
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  Opinion

  Leaving the Ultra-Orthodox World — With No Other Choice

  A young ultra-Orthodox Jewish woman once contacted me with a serious question: ”Should I leave the ultra-Orthodox community?” My reply to her was, “Since you have asked, ‘Should I?’ — then the answer is, ‘No!’” Leaving the ultra-Orthodox Jewish fold is called in Hebrew yetzia bishe’elah — literally, “leaving with a question.” It is a…

  By Yakir Englander Mar 10, 2014 | 3 min read
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  Opinion

  Letty Cottin Pogrebin Looks Back at ‘Free To Be’

  Letty Cottin Pogrebin / Wiki Commons When I think back to my childhood record collection containing Burl Ives stories, the Broadway cast recording of Fiddler on the Roof, and Top Disco Hits of the 1970s, one LP stands out: the generation-defining, gender-equality kids album Free to Be You and Me. Released in 1972, the platinum…

  By Mira Sucharov Mar 9, 2014 | 4 min read
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  Letters

  No Conclusive Evidence on Circumcision Rite and Herpes

  In its editorial, compellingly titled “Protect the Children,” the Forward implores Mayor Bill DeBlasio to not “go wobbly,” urging him to “curtail” Metzitzah B’Peh (often referred to as simply MBP), a part of many ritual circumcisions, which has been asserted to cause Herpes Simplex (HSV1) infections. The editorial is misguided in its medical and policy…

  By Awi Federgruen, and Brenda Breuer, and Daniel Berman Mar 9, 2014 | 4 min read
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  Opinion

  3 Ways To Support Our Jewish Troops and Build Community

  In 2009, my husband, an active-duty naval officer, was deployed to Iraq for 12 months. To prepare for a year without him, my children (then ages 6 and 4) and I moved from our military base in Washington State back into the home we owned in the Washington, D.C., area to be close to our…

  By Alison Buckholtz Mar 7, 2014 | 4 min read
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  Opinion

  Bernie Sanders Serious About White House Bid

  Bernie Sanders protesting the furlough of federal workers, October 2013 / Getty Images Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders seems to be getting more serious about running for president. He discussed it last November with Salon’s Josh Eidelson, but didn’t have much to say about it; the interview was mainly about the issues that animate him. Now,…

  By J.J. Goldberg Mar 6, 2014 | 5 min read